Automation of manufacturing operations has become a common practice in production of many products. It is a frequently employed technique in the case of products which involve assembly of a plurality of components. A principle feature of most automated operations is mechanized feeding of components to a work station where they are assembled with other components to form a subassembly or where they are incorporated into a subassembly or an otherwise completed product. The work station may be manual requiring the presence of a worker who performs the assembly operation or, more advantageously, it also is mechanized to further enhance economy of a products manufacture. Robotic-type apparatus has been devised to perform functions in automated operations such as picking up components delivered to a work station and placing them in a subassembly of a product or in association with another component that is to be incorporated in a subassembly or a major component of a product unit. Automated apparatus is also designed to perform additional fabrication procedures on a component that has been delivered to a work station.
Transport and delivery of components to a work station is a major aspect of these automated manufacturing operations. To achieve that primary objective, it is customary to package the components in association with elongated, flexible tapes with the components being disposed seriatim in relatively spaced apart relationship along the longitudinal axis of the tape at distances compatable with mechanised dispensing and utilization at a work station. These tape packaging systems, while designed primarily to effect transportation of the components, are also frequently of a construction to provide physical protection for the components. This physical protection is often considered essential in the case of electronic components such as solid state devices in the nature of integrated circuit chips having a large number of terminals and associated circuit connecting leads. These terminals and leads are fragile and easily subject to physical damage. Another important advantage of the elongated flexible tapes is that they can be readily coiled for storage and transport to effect conservation of space in addition to being readily adaptive to being placed in operative relationship with apparatus to effect either loading of the components with a tape or in effecting dispensing of the components therefrom.
Packaging systems designed to meet these general objectives have heretofore been devised and utilized in automated manufacturing operations. Examples of prior art tape-form packaging systems intended for use in such automated systems are disclosed in the following listed previously issued U.S. patents:
U.S. Pat. No. 4,583,641 issued Apr. 22, 1986 to John R. Gelzer PA1 U.S. Pat. No. 4,757,895 issued Jul. 19, 1988 to John R. Gelzer PA1 U.S. Pat. No. 5,312,015 issued May 17, 1994 to John R. Gelzer PA1 U.S. Pat. No. 5,472,085 issued Dec. 5, 1995 to John R. Gelzer.
Each of those patents is assigned to GPAX International, Inc., the assignee of this invention. Each of those patents disclose tape packaging systems having the common characteristic of two elongated, strip-form flexible tapes disposed in superposed relationship and mechanically interconnected together to cooperatively secure components therebetween but adapted to be separated to effect dispensing of those components. The disclosed tape systems of each of those patents have a carrier tape and a cover tape which cooperatively form pockets, cavities or receptacles adapted to receive and contain a component. When assembled into a unitary tape structure the combined tapes can be coiled into a relatively compact configuration to minimize space required for storage and transport. When uncoiled and delivered along a longitudinal path to present the components sequentially to a dispensing apparatus at a work station, the carrier and cover tapes are adapted to be separated or otherwise manipulated to enable dispensing of the components.
The first three patents listed in the preceding paragraph disclose tape-packaging structures which can be described or characteristically termed loop-form systems. In each of them the cover tape is formed into a series of elongated loops that extend transversely across the carrier tape and function to enclose the components in cooperation with the carrier tape. These loops are spaced apart along the longitudinal axis of the tapes with adjacent loops being interconnected by portions of the cover tape that project through apertures in the carrier tape and mechanically interlock therewith. These loops project laterally from the surface of the carrier tape and it is not formed with any pockets into which any of the components are disposed.
The fourth listed patent discloses a tape configuration that differs from each of the three loop-type tape systems discussed in the preceeding paragraph in that the carrier tape is provided with pockets for receiving and containing the components. It also differs in that the cover tape comprises an elongated flat strip that overlies the pockets and functions to maintain the components in respective pockets. Fingers integrally formed with the carrier tape mechanically engage with the cover tape to effect its retention but permit the cover tape to longitudinally displace relative to the carrier tape. The objective of this structure is to better enable the tapes to accomodate the difference in longitudinal length of the tapes that occurs as they are coiled into a reel.